Mike Landess, the silver-haired veteran of four decades as a TV anchor, will retire from KMGH in late August. Landess has spent more than 20 years in the Denver market, 16 of them as part of the most ratings-rich team in local TV news history, when paired with Ed Sardella at KUSA.

Among numerous awards, he received Emmys for his live coverage of the bombing at Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park and, in Washington, D.C., for anchoring 16 hours of live coverage after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

“We’ve been talking about it for a couple of years and hitting that 50-year mark seemed like an appropriate time to do it,” Landess said in a statement released by KMGH Thursday.

His first job was in radio in Tyler, Texas, as a high school senior. This year marks his 50th in broadcasting.
His first TV anchor job was in Cleveland.

In 1977 he was hired by Channel 9 (then KBTV) and began a 16-year co-anchor run with Sardella. The duo was unmatched, anchoring the highest-rated late newscast in the country, at times claiming a 51 share. (These days a 14 share wins at 10 p.m.) Their heyday was at a time when local TV news was not challenged by the internet or proliferating cable TV programming.

In 1993 Landess was transferred by Gannett to WXIA in Atlanta after a rocky chapter in his personal history; from there he jumped to WTTG in Washington, D.C. He returned to Denver in 2002 at 7News.

KTVD, the Gannett sibling of KUSA 9News that once was an overflow channel for election nights and a space holder for the future, is now No. 1 at 9 p.m. The 9News newscast on KTVD beat the newscast on KDVR Fox31 for the first time in October in both households and the key news demographic (adults 25-54). KTVD had help from Fox’s Major League Baseball overruns, which meant the KDVR news ran late during much of the month, but the milestone is still noteworthy.

KDVR-KWGN have been undergoing staff turnover and are operating with smaller than usual staffs. At the start of the November sweeps, when local ratings are measured to set ad rates for the future, the stations face an uphill climb.

Forgive Channel 9 for trumpeting its own anniversary during Sunday night’s newscast. The story, by Gary Shapiro, duly noted that the station’s history reflects Denver’s history, from dirt roads to streetcars, from radio to TV and beyond.

The milestone is not exactly news, but it is noteworthy in cool spots the station is running through the month. The then-and-now spots, with audio from 1970s promo material, are a kick. There’s a baby-faced Shapiro and Patti Dennis, side-by-side with their current selves. Ed Sardella, “Stormy” Rottman, Carl Akers and other veterans, on the left huddled around clunky vintage computer terminals in the old Bannock Street basement, in the building that’s now Rocky Mountain PBS. On the right, current staff in the much more plush digs on Speer Blvd. On the left, giant satellite trucks and bulky shoulder-mounted cameras, on the right, iPhone and iPad.

Check out the anniversary spots by Robert Springer, Drew Sidener, Andy Schaeffer and Tommy Collier, here and here.

Why give the network more advertising inventory when you can claim it for yourself?
Denver’s No. 1 TV news station is increasing its output, thereby increasing its advertising intake.
KUSA Channel 9 will produce 5 1/2 hours more news a week starting June 28, and repeat some of it on sister station KTVD, the station announced today.
Bumping a half hour of network time in the morning, from 4:30-5 a.m., and adding a half hour of early local news instead, will mean 2 1/2 more hours a week of morning news. Anchored by a returning favorite, Gregg Moss.
Then, adding a week-nightly half-hour to the 9 p.m. newscast on KTVD Channel 20 will mean another 2 1/2 more hours a week.
Plus, the Sunday newscast on KUSA will expand to a full hour, adding another 30 minutes.
That’s 5 1/2 hours more news than they produced before. (Additionally the early bird 4:30 a.m. show will be repeated at 6:30 a.m. on Channel 20.)
Call it doing more and more and more with less.
News Director Patti Dennis has the go-ahead to hire three staffers, two morning and one evening–each a combination of reporter/editor/producer/videographer.
“I’d rather be in an organization that’s expanding than contracting,” Dennis said. The goal is making news available at time periods that fit people’s lifestyles–“There is an audience for a 4:30 a.m. (newscast) The research says it’s an audience that has to deal with international time zones, that travels…”
Because of this expansion, Gregg Moss will return full-time as anchor of the 4:30 a.m. newscast. Financial, agricultural, travel and business news will be the focus.
The “Early Today” show from NBC moves back to 4 a.m., a move that required network approval.
Additionally, “we feel people do some unplugging on the weekend but Sunday nights have become a good place to plug back in,” Dennis said. Sports results also demand a longer newscast on Sundays, she said.
“We have to continue to adapt to providing what the audience wants when it wants it. There is no shortage of content,” she said.

Joanne Ostrow has been watching TV since before "reality" required quotation marks. "Hill Street Blues" was life-changing. If Dickens, Twain or Agatha Christie were alive today, they'd be writing for television. And proud of it.